First Impressions
by Lisa Telramor
Summary: Saguru returns to Japan for the first time in years. Kaitou Kid has caught his attention in more ways than one, and Kuroba Kaito finds that his first impressions of Saguru could not be further from what he really is. Prequel to A Flavor Without Name. Saguru is a vampire.


_AN: prequel to A Flavor Without Name. Basically I was having fun with the universe and the story kept going. ^_^ Some warnings for blood and brief mentions of murder and human trafficking (people Saguru hunts)_

* * *

The man's lips were lax and open against Saguru's neck. His head lolled to the side. He looked drunk, all foggy eyed and breathless from Saguru's pheromones. He still smelled like blood, blood that was not his own, and a mixture of pain and pleasure. To Saguru it was easy to pick apart which emotion belonged to which person. The man was not a good man.

Saguru tilted the man's face up. "You killed a woman tonight," he said gently so as to keep his prey calm. "What did you do with her body?"

"Dumpster," the man said. He licked his lips and stared hazily at Saguru's lips like he was tempted to kiss. The thought was far from appealing, so Saguru tightened his grip on the man's chin to redirect his thoughts. "Tossed the weapon and shit with her."

"Mm." Saguru let his pheromones coax the man to even more of a stupor. Trust me, he thought. Let go. "Any why did you kill her?"

"She kept smiling at that punk that works with her. Some shit kid a decade younger than her and barely legal. She can't look at people like that. She's supposed to only look at me like that."

"So you thought you'd remind her," Saguru suggested. Disgust curled in his stomach. This was hardly the worst human being he had come across. His kind was depressingly numerous though.

"She yelled," the man said. "Said she was leaving. She can't cheat if she's dead."

"No," Saguru said softly, "she can't." He tilted the man's head up a bit further and leaned down. The man jerked and groaned as Saguru used his fangs to cut into his skin—not bite, biting left too much trauma even if it satisfied his instincts more. Blood welled against his lips and tongue. The man gasped, limp and full of pleasure. Saguru cut his mind off from the potential feedback loop. He wanted none of it even if he preferred not to torture his prey when he fed from them.

They stood in the dark for long minutes as Saguru fed. The blood quenched his thirst in ways human food were unable to accomplish, but it tasted mediocre at best. The blood of murderers and thieves was often not to Saguru's palate. He drank from them anyway because it felt a bit like justice to steal blood from those who spilled it.

Sated, Saguru pulled back. The man was at the edge of consciousness, dizzy from blood loss as well as pheromones now. Saguru bandaged the cut on the man's neck. It would likely be dismissed as an accident. A scrape of no importance in the long run. Saguru would drop him off somewhere and leave an anonymous tip to the police about searching for the woman's body and this man's involvement. Perhaps a second tip to see if the woman's coworker was alive. Saguru did not feel that it was a double murder, but he had been wrong about such things before and so he kept learning.

The metallic tang of blood was too strong on his tongue, bitter with the savage pleasure the man had felt at killing the woman. He wiped his mouth and checked his pocket watch. Two forty-seven in the morning. Tomorrow he had paperwork to collect and then a suitcase to pack for Japan.

There were rumors of global organizations on the rise, and Japan had been at the center of several recently. If that wasn't interesting enough to attract him, the revival of an internationally infamous thief was reason enough to switch locales for a while. It had been a few decades since Saguru spent much time outside of England. His identity was firmly established and the Hakuba family in Japan was more than willing to act as his own. It would be good to see Hakuba Ken again after so long. Ken was getting old and there were few that still remembered Saguru's first life left.

He knelt to drag his most recent meal upright and started carrying him to a more suitable location. Yes, a change of pace was desirable.

~o~

Hakuba Ken was not the one to greet Saguru when he stepped off the plane, instead it was his son, Hakuba Toru, who would be acting as Saguru's father for as long as this identity lasted. Toru smiled and shook his hand once firmly. He had a feeling of confidence and surety around him, no doubt a result of years of working his way up the ranks of the police force.

Of course the media would also appear. Saguru smiled for the cameras and gave his own confident answers to their questions. This life was quite a bit more public than his previous identities. It went against the lessons his creator taught him, but it gave Saguru pleasure to not only stop criminals but be recognized for doing so this time around. The danger of being revealed was real enough, but it added to the thrill. Covering it up with studiousness and a rational mind as he had in the past was never quite as foolproof as he would have liked. Someone who never took risks or lived for rushes of adrenaline would never have been in a situation to be changed into a vampire in the first place though.

"We have a room set up for you," Toru said. "Since you will be my 'son' for a while, please feel free to make it home." He smiled. "Father regrets he couldn't be here to pick you up, but hopes you'll visit him at his laboratory sometime soon."

"Of course." Saguru smiled, a much more relaxed smile than he'd given the cameras. "I look forward to catching up. It has been many years since we last had time to chat face to face."

"Funny how time works," Toru said, striding ahead toward a waiting car.

"Yes." The light mood that had filled him at the thought of seeing his old friend dimmed. As ever it was only Saguru that showed no visible effects of time. "Time is an odd thing."

~o~

It took a handful of minutes after meeting the Kaitou Kid task force to wonder if the officers were entirely competent. Men rushed to and fro and Nakamori-keibu seemed to rely on shouting to relay orders rather than any clear duties and plan. It was terribly chaotic and Saguru wouldn't be surprised if the so-called legendary thief took advantage of the disorder to pull of half the heists to his name. The officers couldn't even properly synch up their watches for goodness sake.

It had stung to be introduced like a miscreant child in need of a lesson for how the police worked. Saguru understood the reasoning behind it of course. It did not make the introduction any less a blow to his pride though.

Nakamori did not have even the most rudimentary of information on the thief. Height, weight, and general age range should have been one of the first things drawn up for Kid's profile, but the head of the task force had not seemed to have a clue. The bewildering mix of confusion, anger, and desperation the man had smelled of when Saguru asked raised the question of whether this was willful ignorance or not. Why the man chasing an infamous thief wouldn't want to confirm rudimentary details was a question that required investigation. Perhaps it was related to Kid's period of inactivity. All threads of information pointed to the current Kid to be a separate person than the one eight years ago despite their similarities in methods.

Saguru left Nakamori-keibu to his chaos. There was investigating to be done.

There was a notebook in the snow, a police notebook. Something that an officer wouldn't leave behind. The scents that cling to it led him to a car where a man—the owner of the notebook—was bound and sleeping off some sort of drug.

That was answer to if Kid takes advantage of the chaos. Kid's scent is like chaos in its own way. Bitter and sweet with an ozone-like tang that reminded Saguru of lightning about to strike. It called to him instinctually and Saguru found himself reverting to his hunting stalk rather than the more cognizant and observant investigative mindset he had been in.

On the roof Saguru found a balloon waiting. He smirked. Kid's plans were clear from the bits and pieces Saguru had seen.

He stalked back to the painting, staying out of the way until Kid's own brand of chaos started.

It was depressing at how willingly Nakamori blinded himself to the truth to go haring off after Kid's tricks. Beyond the chemical smell of the smoke Kid used to pull off his trick, Saguru could smell Kid's intriguing scent bright and strong. The remaining officer in the room, a ringer for the man tied up in the car.

"Sleight of hand is not much use on an audience that has no interest in being fooled," Saguru said conversationally. It was tempting to rush out and brazenly accuse the thief, but that hardly ever went over well. Kid whipped around and Saguru licked his lips at the spike of adrenaline Kid's scent flooded him with. "Smoke and mirrors are petty illusions and easily seen through to be sure. I had hoped to see better considering your reputation.

Shock, disbelief, wariness, and fear warred for dominance in Kid's scent while outwardly he remained calm. Kid took a step back, eyes flicking to his escape route.

"It's too late you know." Saguru grinned as Kid lost his disguise and dashed for the balcony. His scent had flooded with confidence, the emotion reflected in the smug smirk on his face. Kid had yet to face a true challenge it seemed. Too confident in his skills by far. Saguru could smell the second he realized the balloon had been cut. "I took care of that as soon as I realized what your plan was."

"Hah." Kid tipped his hat. "A strong move." His smile stayed clear on his face.

"There's nowhere to go," Saguru said. "Your glider won't be any help with this weather." As if to prove him right, the wind gusted erratically, swirling Kid's cape around the thief's ankles. Saguru stalked closer, focusing on keeping his movements within the human range of motion. He wasn't sure how well he succeeded. "Why do you steal?" he asked, curiosity cutting into his hunting stalk, or perhaps, only settling him into it more as it was the sort of question he asked all of his criminal prey. Kid smelled young, far younger than the eight year gap accounted for. Mark one box for it not being the original Kid.

"Why, Tantei-san," Kid said with a wide grin that promised chaos. His scent got stronger and more concentrated the closer Saguru got, wild and intoxicating. "That's your job to find out!" He leapt, glider coming out despite the weather. Kid had to know it wouldn't bear his weight properly.

Saguru covered the rest of the distance with inhuman speed, reaching the balcony in time to see Kid spin away in a gust of wind like a kite without a string. The gust dropped him near Nakamori-keibu and his officers, still stubbornly looking for the escaping Kid. Well, Saguru thought, they had a target now. Somehow they failed to catch him even with Kid falling right into their hands.

It was interesting to note that a man that could leap onto a balcony wearing a cape and balance even with high winds did not have the balance and coordination necessary for ice skating. If Nakamori could blind himself to Kid's flaws, well, that was one more reason he was never going to be capable of catching Kid.

With the winter air diffusing what remained of Kid's scent, Saguru realized he had been in the entirely wrong mindset to deal with a master thief. Kid was not prey no matter what his instincts said. Kid was a criminal who posed an interesting challenge, and perhaps a step to darker mysteries if the hushed up accounts of gunmen appearing at Kid heists Toru had showed him were true.

He sighed and closed his casebook. He doubted looking over the scene once more would give much more information. Kid was an enigma, more so for how his scent had affected Saguru's instincts. It would be easy to pick it out in a crowd at least.

Tomorrow he had the tedious task of playing human teenager. It was no more pleasant the fifth time around than it had been when he was actually a teenager receiving an education for the first time. He still preferred to learn on his own and to his own taste than to any prescribed lesson plan.

He made sure his watch and notebook were in their proper pockets and glanced at where Nakamori and his men were finally pulling themselves out of their dogpile on the ice. Nakamori's bellows of rage could be heard even at a distance. The polite thing to do would be to join up with him again and at least pretend he was grateful for being permitted on scene. Sometimes Saguru hated that he had been raised to do the polite thing regardless of his personal feelings.

~o~

Kid was Saguru's classmate.

It took less than a minute in the room to pinpoint the scent as one Kuroba Kaito, sixteen, 174 centimeters in height, roughly 58 kilograms give or take a few grams. His build and height matched Kid's even if Saguru couldn't smell the same strong scent from him. And the moment he laid eyes on Saguru, Kuroba's blood rushed with panic and horror.

If he was completely human without any enhanced senses, that reaction alone would have had Saguru's instincts primed. A good sense of smell cut down investigative time by far, but putting puzzle pieces together was what made Saguru enjoy being a detective. It was no fun if he didn't know the how and why of things.

Saguru made sure to give Kuroba a charming smile. Including his friend—Nakamori Aoko, related to the inspector? Interesting—in that smile got the most amusing defensive reaction.

If Saguru found himself leaning a bit too close to Kuroba one too many times over the course of the first day, well, it had been a long while since he had run across a scent that appealed to him so much. At least it could be excused as intimidation tactics. Kuroba postured aggressively right back. It was going to be more interesting in Japan that he had hoped. Finding Kaito Kid in his home room class almost made up for having to spend time in yet another secondary school classroom.

~o~

Days with Kuroba were an interesting challenge of control, both emotional and physical. If Saguru wracked his brain, he could remember people who had grated on his nerves like sandpaper from their personalities alone, but he could not remember any of those people simultaneously triggering his hunting instincts. If anything, their personalities had been enough to turn Saguru off of the idea of ever feeding from them. He wondered if part of the issue was because, no matter how irritating Kuroba's penchant for pranks and chaos was, he had a fascinating and sharp mind that Saguru could appreciate.

Kid—Kuroba—thought sideways and in perpendiculars rather than the linear way most people did. It was all great fun to keep up with that logic. Saguru had to remind himself that it was not a game. Kid was a thief and one who had potentially lethal people acting around him in the shadows. Kid was a first step toward larger threats; a point on a line or perhaps more accurately, a lure. Nothing indicated Kid worked with the shadows. The more Saguru dug into the previous Kid's disappearance and Kuroba's own family, he thought it might be possible that Kid was actively working against them. More information was needed to prove that hypothesis though.

Saguru sighed. If only he could skip to the part of his identity where he could act as a professional adult and pursue detective work exclusively. Unfortunately it was important in this age of technology to have as many witnesses and documents to prove who he was that graduating from high school was a necessity.

Teenagers were incredibly frustrating at times.

Young women two seats over giggled to each other as Saguru collected his belongings for the day. If anyone were to look at his notes, they were impeccable. No one would be able to tell that his mind had been on topics far flung from the narrow topic of mid-twentieth century Japanese literature.

Saguru could feel Kuroba moving without even looking in his direction. Across the room, Koizumi Akako had the usual gaggle of men around her. Saguru's lip curled slightly. He had nothing against witches in particular, but her casual abuse of power was annoying and her scent was as much of an irritant as Kuroba's was a pleasure.

Behind him, Nakamori Aoko argued with Kuroba. He had been right about her being the inspector's daughter and in an ironical way it was hilarious that Kid was close friends with the daughter of the man trying to arrest him. But they bickered like an old married couple that should have gotten a divorce a decade ago.

"Hakuba-kun, tell Kaito he's being an idiot!" Aoko said, dragging Saguru into whatever their current argument was. She seemed to expect him to side with her on anything Kid related since he was also attempting to catch Kid. It was all rather exhausting, not the least because it led to Kuroba getting a bit too close and making Saguru seethe with hunger that was a pain to control.

Saguru replayed the last few minutes he had tuned out to determine what he was supposed to be telling Kuroba he was an idiot about. "Kuroba, Nakamori-chan, I am sure that progress will come with the next Kid heist toward putting Kaitou Kid behind bars."

Aoko pouted. "You're supposed to say you and Tou-san will catch Kid this time!"

"We'll catch Kid this time," Saguru parroted deadpan.

Aoko giggled and Kuroba glared. "Funny, but I haven't seen you do much of anything," Kuroba huffed. "From what I hear neither you or Nakamori-keibu came close to catching Kid last time."

Saguru found himself leaning forward to respond to the challenge without thinking, and that was both why Kuroba was interesting and a threat at the same time. Saguru felt his fangs ache. He needed to feed again tonight. He couldn't be healthier from the frequent feedings, but it was a nuisance to track down prey on an almost daily basis. "A detective knows patience. Setting a proper trap takes time and observation, wouldn't you agree?"

Kuroba's scent and eyes showed momentary uneasiness. Too much predatory aura? Saguru's words? Whichever the case, Kuroba pushed them away with his usual bravado. "Kid's too smart to fall for your traps. Detectives are just critics for the performance he's putting on."

"Spoken like a showman. And you feel Kid thinks like a showman as well? A magician like yourself perhaps?" Saguru gave him a shark's smile.

The uneasiness flickered again, but Kuroba smiled with teeth bared right back. "Well it's a lot of spotlights on Kid and the police scrambling to figure out his tricks. But like all critics they won't be able to pick them apart. They'd be better off just enjoying the spectacle like the public does."

"Mm." Saguru leaned back. He had been invading Kuroba's personal space a bit too far. Defiance was an alluring scent on Kuroba. "Kid had better take care that his ego does not exceed his skill. The moment it does, he will trip, and there will be someone waiting to catch him."

"You?" Kuroba asked.

"Perhaps." If not Saguru or Nakamori, the shadows lurking around Kid would. One man—no, not even a man yet—against the world. Kid seemed to revel in dramatics. Saguru smiled at Aoko and gave her a small half-bow that made her blush. "Nakamori-chan. Have a good evening."

Behind him as he walked away, he heard Aoko shift to needing a date to a concert while Kuroba glared a hole in his back. _Really_ , Saguru thought. _Teenagers_.

~o~

Saguru wiped blood from his lips. The criminal prey of the day was slumped against the dingy bathroom of the motel room. After the disaster of the last heist, Saguru had needed blood to calm down. Kid had made a fool or Saguru and the police again, managing to get away. The statue he was stealing was intact at least. But Kid had distracted him terribly with his scent and Saguru had made elementary mistakes. It was embarrassing and unprofessional, and should have been avoidable because Saguru had fed the night before.

Slowly, Saguru was finding Kid operated outside of all norms and that included Saguru's. But Kid had made a mistake and left a hair behind. For Saguru with access to Ken's labs it would be enough to get proof to set Nakamori-keibu on the right track, and for himself he could perhaps see what would make Kid's scent such an aberration.

The woman groaned from the floor. Saguru knelt and checked the cut on her throat. It had stopped bleeding already. By the time the police found her it would be properly scabbed and looking closer to a day old than a fresh wound.

Saguru rubbed the back of his neck. He'd been less restrained than usual between his irritation and the fact that the woman in front of him was involved with child trafficking. She would have side effects from the blood loss for the next few days and a sizable gap in her memories as well. He willed her to slip back into deeper unconsciousness and she did, going limp again with a sigh.

Saguru sent Toru a text with the location of the motel room and a tip to check one of the warehouses in the industrial district for the hidden rooms the children were being trafficked through. A follow up text was sent to Ken about the possibility of using the labs, and would he like to have a cup of tea over a game of chess sometime that week? There would be no answers from Ken tonight.

With one more brush of the woman's mind to keep her in deep sleep for the next few hours at the very least, he left the motel room and its occupant behind him.

~o~

Kid had shifter blood. The paper was blurry in front of Saguru's eyes as he hadn't slept in more than forty-eight hours, but the results of the genetic test were clear. What the test revealed about Kuroba was nothing Saguru didn't already know with his other senses, but it would be enough to knock Nakamori out of his denial. And perhaps make him look in the right direction. The man couldn't be incompetent to have reached his position, so the only thing Saguru could fathom was that he was subconsciously sabotaging himself for some reason.

He sighed. Nakamori-keibu was coming to the lab soon and Saguru would have to pretend he didn't already know and go about how he would investigate if he didn't have scent proof.

A nap would be nice.

A nap was a long way off.

How did Kid's shifter blood affect him? Was it dormant, or did it aid Kid with his heists? Did that lead to his penchant for mischief? Then again, Kid was in a league all his own. Saguru was better off not assuming anything. He picked up his phone.

"Nakamori-keibu," Saguru said when the call went through. "I have some things to show you."

~o~

Nakamori's ability for denial was a whole new level of stubbornness, Saguru decided, rubbing his eyes. Only time would tell if Saguru's words got through. And there was yet another heist that night to look forward to with no time to hunt beforehand.

The inane chatter of high school students, Aoko chasing Kuroba with a mop, Koizumi's brainwashed admirers, and the sound of the school bell all added to the pounding headache that was starting to form behind Saguru's eyes.

He shuffled papers to gather his things and almost took a mop to the back of the head as Kuroba and Aoko got a bit too close. His shoulders hunched.

Aoko whipped around to look for an ally in him as she had been since Saguru got there. "I'm coming to the heist tonight," she announced.

"Are you now." Saguru was in no mood to play suave to piss Kuroba off. He managed a strained smile for her though. "I am sure Kid will be intimidated by your mop wielding prowess."

"Don't be rude," Aoko said. She sniffed. "I want to be there to see when Kid gets caught."

"Nakamori-chan, if you do not mind me asking, why are you so vehemently against Kaitou Kid?"

"Tou-san spends all his time chasing Kid," Aoko muttered before shaking her head. "And he's breaking the law! How can so many people be fans of a thief?"

"Hmm." So it was a personal reason first and foremost. Nakamori-keibu did seem to get tunnel vision and ignore other important things in his headlong dive to catch Kid. Behind Saguru, Kuroba's scent got stronger. Saguru smiled as an idea formed. "Kuroba, I invite you to come to the Kid heist tonight."

"Him too?" Aoko said. "But he's Kid's fan."

"I'm sure a showman like Kuroba can provide a…unique outlook on Kid's abilities," Saguru said calmly.

Kuroba narrowed his eyes.

"Unless you have plans," Saguru said. He smirked, knowing it would get the reaction he wanted. As expected there was a flicker of calculation before Kuroba got caught up in his own ego again.

"Sure, I'll be there," he said.

"Wonderful." Saguru slid his papers into his bag. "I'm sure some things will become much clearer with your presence."

"No!"

From across the room, Akako stormed out of her group of followers. "Kuroba, don't go tonight." She stared Kuroba down before grabbing his arm. "Come with me." She sent a glare Saguru's way.

Saguru's lip twitched with the desire to bare a fang at her. He reigned it in.

Aoko looked back and forth between them before waving to Saguru. "I should probably find out what they're up to. See you at the heist tonight, Hakuba-kun!"

Saguru lifted a hand. That left…four hours to catch up on sleep before helping with the preparations for heist. If he had that long. Definitely no time for the time it took to hunt and clean up after. Perhaps he should have left some of the lab work to the lab technicians rather than doing it himself, but he was the only one who would have known what to look for with supernatural genetics.

He was almost out the door to the school when he smelled the witch. He couldn't ignore her when she came up to him and fisted a hand in his shirt.

"Walk with me," she said with a toothy smile that rivaled Saguru's own with his fangs out.

"I would rather not," he said.

"Too bad." They took a left, moving down a hallway that didn't have people milling around. She pushed him into a deserted classroom. Her scent had Kuroba's mixing with it. It was an unpleasant combination.

Koizumi snapped the door closed. Saguru stood with his hands in his pockets while she stared him up and down. "Stay away from Kuroba," she said.

Saguru felt mildly surprised. "I wasn't aware you had any claim over him." There were no scent markers or lingering spells. Kuroba was his own person and no witch-thrall like some of the other students.

Koizumi flushed and that was even stranger. "Kuroba is my target, vampire. Keep your fangs out of it."

"I'm not aiming to hunt him," Saguru said. "I am a detective first and foremost. Witch," he added since it seemed they were reduced to speciesist labels.

Her eyes narrowed and for a moment he could swear her eyes glowed red before she was poking him in the chest. "I don't know what you're doing here and I don't really care what kind of game you're playing, but leave him out of it. There are plenty of other people to fixate on."

Saguru let his fangs grow and curled his lip in subtle threat. "Madame, that is why Kid is the perfect target to follow. He leads to the darker shadows while he creates a spotlight." He pushed her hand away. "I have no intention of hunting him, but if I can arrest him, who knows what might crawl out of the woodwork?"

"You're making a mistake," she growled.

Saguru could put her growl to shame, but he didn't. Instead, he retracted his fangs and put on his best English gentleman presentation and smiled. "I will believe I am making a mistake when I believe your motivation comes from more than desperation to control a man who has thwarted your spells more than once."

Koizumi went white then red before narrowing her eyes. All at once, Saguru was hit by a wave of her seduction spell, a much more concentrated version of it than she used on their classmates.

He felt his breath speed up and heat come to his face.

Koizumi smirked cruelly at him. "Well what do you know, there's a man left underneath the blood sucker after all." Her eyelids went half-mast as magic curled around him. "You're not immune to my magic either."

Saguru blinked slowly. It took effort to look away and even after he did the after image of red lips and the silky sheen of her hair were imprinted behind his eyelids. It was only her scent that kept him from giving in to the spell; it still repelled him even as her magic attracted him. "Better a blood sucker than a seductress," he managed, swallowing hard.

Koizumi laughed once sharply. "Don't quibble morals. I'm sure you've seduced your prey before and does that give you the moral high or low ground here?" She touched Saguru's neck with one finger and he shuddered.

"Enough," he growled. If she pushed too far the seduction spell would trip into bloodlust and he didn't want her blood on his lips no matter how many past acquaintances swore by the restorative power of witch blood.

"Stay away from Kuroba," Koizumi said one last time before letting the spell drop.

Saguru pulled himself together with what dignity he could salvage and bared fangs at her. "This isn't over."

"No it isn't." She stepped aside to let him reach the door. Koizumi looked satisfied that she had gotten the upper hand, but Saguru had never promised anything. "We both have places to be."

Saguru pushed past her taking small pleasure in how she bristled at his shoulder almost knocking into her. Koizumi was one more factor to keep track of. He was sure that she would stick her nose in again, but Saguru had no intention of changing his plans for the night.

~o~

Cuffing Kid to him was a mistake, Saguru realized, one he realized within the first ten minutes of cuffing him. Not only did that put him in close proximity with Kuroba and his abnormally attractive scent, it meant that every time Kuroba tried to escape he tripped Saguru's instincts one step closer to the edge.

Saguru caught the back of Kuroba's shirt as he tried to walk away again. "Just hold still," Saguru muttered. According to his pocket watch, Kid was slated to arrive in two minutes and thirty-seven seconds.

Kuroba scowled and jerked the hand cuffed to Saguru's so that Saguru almost fumbled his watch. Saguru scowled.

"Don't. If you're not Kid then you have nothing to worry about, now do you?"

"Your tests are all bull crap," Kuroba grumbled. He tried to maneuver them closer to the gem since he couldn't get away. Saguru casually redirected them until they were all but stepping on each other's toes in a semi-circular arc. "If you really looked up all those students, there had to be at least a dozen names."

"There were, but they didn't match proximity or other factors while you did," Saguru said. Forty-two seconds. If he focused enough on the watch he hoped he could keep from pouncing on Kuroba. Kuroba stomped on his foot. "Ouch!" For a second he lost control of his fangs, but he doubted Kuroba noticed. Saguru slid his watch away. "That hurt."

"And you handcuffed me to you; you deserve it." He made another attempt to get away.

"Inspector!" one of the officers called. "It's time!"

The room got quiet as everyone held their breath for the thief to appear. Across the room Saguru heard Aoko say, "Huh, is he not coming?"

Kuroba smelled like stress and irritation and the edge of panic that was so systematically repressed that Saguru doubted he even noticed its existence. Saguru couldn't help leaning into his space. "You had better confess who you are," he said.

Kuroba glared and that defiance did weird things to Saguru's instincts. It made Kuroba prey worthy of being hunted rather than the criminals Saguru usually ate from. From the confused blink Kuroba gave him, Saguru realized he was losing control of his pheromones, trying to lull Kuroba into complacency before a bite.

At that moment someone laughed and crashed onto the pedestal with the gem. For one wild moment Saguru's brain wondered that if in spite of all evidence to the contrary he had been wrong right up until the scent hit him and the false Kid summoned a broom. The witch. He laughed incredulously. The witch was impersonating Kid to get Kuroba out of Saguru's trap.

Above, the broom wobbled as Nakamori sprung a trap of his own. A phantom thief Koizumi Akako was not. Her persona was already slipping.

In the moment Saguru was distracted, Kuroba slipped away. Saguru realized it when the handcuffs went limp on his wrist. He heard the hiss of something in the air right before the lights went out. Another hiss and Koizumi's broom made it out the window.

Saguru snorted. Of course. Kid would free her regardless of how ambiguous their standing with each other was. It took a moment to locate Kuroba in the dark. It would be so easy to cross the space and catch him. Too easy. Saguru stopped breathing, counting backwards from ten until his fangs shrunk and he had control over his reflexes again.

Koizumi would be long gone. Interacting further with Kuroba would be…inadvisable. Saguru was not someone ruled by his instincts, but even he could admit when he needed to pull himself out of a situation that was making it difficult.

Aoko and Kuroba were arguing about something—whether or not Kid was gay? How did that topic come about? Saguru shook his head. Nakamori-keibu was muttering curse words under his breath and ordering his men to do a sweep. No one would notice if Saguru bowed out for the night.

He sighed. The night wasn't over yet. He had a hunt to do before he could sleep. Seventy-two hours was about as long as he could trust himself in between feedings when Kuroba was around.

While the police were absorbed in combing the floor for hairs and Kuroba and Aoko were absorbed in each other, Saguru stepped back into the shadows. Let a bit of instinct come out and it was the easiest thing in the world to disappear from the scene of the crime as smoothly as Kid was no doubt able to.

~o~

Today's prey was easy to find and Saguru was terribly grateful for that. He was riled up from the heist but that adrenaline faded quickly in comparison of almost three days with less than six hours of sleep between them.

The prey was yakuza, young and in the middle of extorting money from an older man. Saguru stepped in right before it started getting physical. One glance was enough to send the old man scrambling to safety as the yakuza man turned his attention on Saguru.

There was likely nothing Saguru could do to get him arrested. There were no cameras and he doubted the old man would come forward to the police. Still, the yakuza man fell far enough in the bad category that Saguru felt no moral compunctions about taking his blood.

Saguru grinned as the man swung at him and let his body change subtly, let the inhumanity settle through him. His reflexes became better, movements smoother, and heightened strength. His senses were boosted and it was easy to step to the side and use the yakuza man's momentum against him. When he went for a knife, Saguru plucked it from his belt faster than the man could get his hand around it.

"What the hell are you?" the man asked with a nervous tremble in his voice. His hand opened and closed on the empty air where his knife had been.

Saguru tilted the blade—cheap but well cared for and sharp, several nicks in the blade showing that it had been used in fights before—and the light from a neon sign outside the alley reflected off it in red and blue lines. "You've had this for a long time, but you could afford better. Do you keep it for sentimental reasons?" Stalking to the left, Saguru herded the man back step by step toward the wall and the bags of trash sorted neatly along it. The man's eyes flicked to the knife and Saguru, to the trash bags and the neon-lit street beyond the alley.

"Look," the man said, "I'll leave the old guy alone. Just let me go."

"That's not going to happen," Saguru said. He let the man see his fangs. The stink of fear filled the alleyway, sour and bitter. The man tried to bolt. Saguru cut him off. Intimidation tactics were satisfying to turn on people who enjoyed the fear of others. Perhaps hypocritical, but Saguru had been someone people tried to cow a few lifetimes ago.

The man shook, his eyes riveted on Saguru's fangs. "You're not human."

"No." Smiling always felt odd around fangs. "No I am not." Saguru touched the man's cheek with his own knife and he froze.

The man's tension increased and Saguru knew it would break, likely on the side of violence. Saguru let his pheromones flip frozen terror to mind numbing endorphins. His prey swayed in his grasp looking dazed. Saguru set the knife aside. It clattered against the concrete scree and cigarette butts littering the alley.

"What is…?" His prey blinked and moved like the air had turned to pudding, lifting a hand to push Saguru away only to find he didn't have the strength to push. "How…?"

"Shh." Most people didn't have the clarity to do even that much when faced with the full effect of Saguru's hormones. Saguru tilted the man's head to the side. He breathed in the scent at the man's neck—soured by the lingering fear scent and cheap cologne, but much more pleasant than most people he fed from. The pulse of blood made his jaw ache. He tilted his head to make the cut with the edge of his fangs.

"What the hell are you doing?!"

Saguru bit down instead. Shit.

"Hakuba!" Kuroba—or Kid; was he in uniform?—yelped.

Saguru pulled back and blood gushed from the puncture wounds. Shit. The prey made a sound that was very much not the pleasure that had been fogging his head a moment ago. Saguru slapped a hand over the wound to put pressure on it and keep it from bleeding out. Kuroba—and it was Kuroba though he was dressed in all black clothing that Saguru assumed he wore when doing undercover work in preparation for heists. He stank of fear and anger so strongly it warped his scent to manageably intriguing rather than distracting. Granted the amount of blood was catching Saguru's attention a lot more than Kuroba's scent right then. "This is a bad time," Saguru grunted.

"I thought you were a good person," Kuroba said. "Stuck up and annoying as hell, but one with morals." He had his card gun out now and Saguru did not need this right now.

"I do have morals," Saguru said.

"You're killing a man in a back alley!"

"I'm not killing him I'm…" Saguru looked at the man he was holding and realized he was applying too much pressure to the neck wound from the way the man's eyes were rolling back in his head like he was about to faint. Damn it. He lightened the pressure. "I was feeding. Not killing."

As fast as the first accusation came, Kuroba looked sick all over again, "You're a vampire. Witches and homicidal robots and assassins and immortality stones. Of course vampires are real."

"Kuroba." Saguru raised the hand not keeping the yakuza man's wound under pressure and almost lost a finger when Kuroba shot one of his razor cards at it. If Saguru's hadn't had vampiric reflexes, he might have lost a good half his hand. Saguru stayed very still. "Yes, Kuroba, I am a vampire. And as you put it, witches are real. After Koizumi-san it should be no great shock that other supernatural beings exist."

"How did you get here? How did you pass off being human?" The card gun wavered and Saguru hoped Kuroba wouldn't accidentally set it off. "How did people miss the dead bodies of your prey in this day in age?"

Saguru sighed. "Kuroba, I don't kill my prey." Case in point, the man in Saguru's grasp made a high pitched whining sound, pawing weakly at the hand on his neck. Saguru controlled himself enough to let pheromones calm the man into being cooperative even if he wasn't going to get him into a trance again any time soon. "The average human stomach can't hold the amount of blood it would take to drain a full grown adult man dry. For the average human stomach it isn't comfortable to drain a full grown adult man to the point of unconsciousness."

"That argument is only valid if you were human!"

Saguru sighed and his fangs made small cuts on his lower lip. All he had wanted was enough blood to calm him down and a good twenty hours of sleep.

Kuroba seemed to be cross-referencing what he knew from pop culture about vampires with what he knew about Saguru. "Wait, you go out during the day. And you crossed running water—does the ocean count? You have a reflection and I've seen you eat regular food! With garlic!"

"Kuroba, this really is not the time." Since he didn't look like he was going to shoot him at the moment, too caught up in his analysis probably, Saguru turned his attention back to his unfortunate prey. The puncture wounds were bleeding much more sluggishly now, though he still needed medical attention. Well, a crude bandage would have to be enough until an ambulance came. One of Saguru's clean handkerchiefs cut into strips would work. "Besides, humans create rules to explain things to make them less terrifying. No one wants to believe that supernatural beings could exist right next to them." He absently sent the man into unconsciousness to make it simpler. From the sharp intake of breath behind him, he probably shouldn't have done that.

"I'm treating his wound, Kuroba. Calm down."

"You caused it in the first place." Kuroba was closer now, still wary, but not reeking of terror like a moment ago.

"Ordinarily I would not savage my prey's neck. You startled me." The cloth of his handkerchief ripped like rice paper. It was well worn and soft. He wadded one strip over the wound and used the others to secure it. Blood was already seeping through the makeshift bandage, but it would have to be enough. "And now instead of ending my very long night with a full belly and instincts calm enough to sleep, I'll be calling an ambulance and returning home to clean up and hope I can sleep with the smell of blood lingering all over me."

Kuroba scowled. "It looked like you were killing him, Hakuba, what the hell did you expect?"

"Frankly, I expected you to be home and avoiding me after the heist."

"You looked suspicious," Kuroba blurted. "Slipping out like that."

"I was very tired and really needed to hunt and now I am no better off than I started out the night." Saguru regarded the blood on his hands and where it had dripped down his wrists and debated how unnerving it would be to taste it… He was hungry. He decided against it. Kuroba might still be trigger happy.

There was four feet between Saguru and Kuroba when he looked up, enough space that Kuroba felt safe never mind that Saguru could have crossed it in a fraction of a second should he desire to do so. Kuroba's gun was still out, but it was pointed toward the ground rather than at anywhere vulnerable on Saguru's person.

Saguru pulled out his phone. "I'm calling an ambulance. Would you like to do the honors of talking with whoever picks up the phone or should I take a shot at modifying my voice?"

Kuroba was on the defensive again and for what felt like the hundredth time that night, Saguru sighed again.

"I know," Saguru said. "It is not conjecture or theory or a matter of proof, Kuroba. I know you are Kid because I can smell you. Scent would not hold up in court, but I have known you were Kid from the moment I saw you in homeroom." He held out the phone.

Kuroba, so pale he resembled Saguru's prey when he wasn't careful about how much blood he drank, reached to take it. He took a breath and punched the numbers into it before raising it to his ear. Saguru could tell when someone picked up on the other end because the voice that came out of Kuroba's mouth was a woman's voice, older and scared-sounding. "I found…there's a man. Bleeding. I…he needs help."

Kuroba's voice wavered through a distressed woman being calmed down by the operator even as his eyes never left Saguru's face. He declined to stay on the phone until the ambulance arrived. Kuroba pressed the button to disconnect and tossed it back.

"We should leave," Saguru said sliding the phone into his pocket. Later he would probably have to replace the phone to keep all clues away from himself, but that was fine. The only loose end now was the knife. Saguru shouldn't have touched it even if it had been satisfying to terrify the man with it. He bent to retrieve it and took the sheathe from the yakuza man's body so he didn't cut himself with it.

"You're keeping it?" Kuroba asked sharply.

"Fingerprints," Saguru said calmly. "While I doubt they can get much more information from the man, my prints are in the system and accurate. I would rather not have to call in favors to cover up my mistakes."

"Do this often?" Kuroba said and then, "Oh, god, you're supposed to be the son of the head of the police. How does that even work?"

"I'm close friends with Hakuba Ken, my supposed grandfather." Saguru tucked away the knife. "Now if we could leave before the ambulance arrives?"

"He won't remember you?"

"No." Saguru had made sure of that. The only people who would remember Saguru was here were the old man from earlier and Kuroba, and Saguru doubted either of them would mention him. They had nothing to gain from doing so.

"Neat trick," Kuroba muttered, quietly enough that Saguru suspected he wasn't supposed to have heard.

"Are you coming with me or leaving on your own?"

It took between one step and the next for Kuroba to decide. He kept stride at Saguru's side as they left the scene and the sound of sirens got closer. "I have questions."

"And I'll answer what I can if you answer a few of mine," Saguru said.

"I meant it when I said you're a detective and should figure out my motives on your own," Kuroba said, showing deductive skills of his own at where he anticipated the line of questioning going.

"You can tell me if my hypothesis is correct then," Saguru said. He was still tired and hungry and it would undoubtedly be difficult to spend however long it took to exchange questions in the same room as Kuroba. He made plans to start tea if Kuroba could be convinced to go to Saguru's current residence for this discussion. Tea always made difficult situations easier.

 **Bonus** :

"So you were human once," Kuroba said, days after the first question and answer session about the basics of vampirism and Kid's history. They'd revealed the minimum of what they had to about each other, and that had been fine.

Somehow Saguru found that while Kuroba remained wary around him, he was accepted into lunch with Aoko and conversations where he hadn't been before.

It was too soon to call each other friends. Respectful rivals was perhaps more accurate. Saguru had clearly stated that he planned to continue chasing Kid as best as he was humanly capable of. Emphasis on humanly.

They watched Aoko chase someone other than Kuroba with her mop today as Saguru mulled over Kuroba's question.

"Yes, I was once human," he said after a while. Aoko had the unfortunate classmate cornered. He hadn't stood a chance without Kuroba's acrobatic prowess. "Why?"

"I was just thinking about it." Kuroba shrugged. To any onlookers, they would appear interested in Aoko's spectacle and doodling in a notebook respectively. "You aren't really Hakuba Saguru, and you probably weren't always a detective."

"No I wasn't."

"When were you born?"

Saguru smiled. "1882."

"And you're British." Kuroba sighed, doodling a Union Jack in the corner of his notebook. "No wonder you have a Sherlock Holmes obsession; you're actually from the right time and place."

"I grew up reading the stories." Saguru shrugged. "Some things are nostalgic. I am well aware that Holmes is an imperfect character in retrospect, but I found his logic appealing. I was actually studying in hopes of becoming a doctor at one point though so I suppose both Holmes and Watson had an impact on me."

"You didn't end up a doctor though."

"No." Once it had bothered him. Never aging meant it was much harder to become a doctor and no one would take him seriously. Though it was true that it was hard enough to get respect in his later choice of detective work. "I was changed before I got into medical school. I had barely finished secondary school."

"That kind of sucks." In his doodles, a Watson-Saguru stared down a Holmes-Saguru.

"Though you're not quite right about me being British."

"Oh?"

"I was born in London and am a British citizen, but I'm half Irish." Saguru waved as Aoko made her way back from threatening their classmate away from the path of lechery. She grinned triumphantly. "I'm a London Irish vampire and my aunt wouldn't stop making crucifix jokes for months after I was changed."

"I don't get how that's important." Kuroba said, but he was already doodling Saguru as a leprechaun.

"It's not," though it was in its own way. He wanted someone to know in this life, Saguru supposed. And he thought Kuroba might appreciate Saguru's current name choice someday if Saguru ever shared the name he was born to with him.

"The world must have changed a lot," Kuroba muttered.

"It's always changing."

Aoko joined them and they stopped talking about it. Saguru looked forward to seeing where their tentative balance took them.

* * *

 _Note: Bonus bit is included because Saguru's past name is Sheridan in this universe for the sole reason that it is derived from Sirideán, which means "searcher" in Gaelic which fit with his theme. :) Source for this is name is at BehindtheName website, so if I am wrong about that meaning, I am sorry. Also, if Saguru was Irish and raised Catholic, it would be pretty funny due to the supposed incompatibility with vampirism. You know. Crucifixes and holy water and all._


End file.
